Brad Sherman Commends Treasury Sec. Janet Yellen On Electronic Tax Return Innovations

4 months ago

On Tuesday, Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) questioned Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Biden-Harris economic policy during a House Financial Services Committee hearing.

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Transcript

00:00Hornia has recognized Mr. Sherman. Madam Secretary, I want to commend you and the entire Biden

00:06economic team. Over the last couple of years, we've seen the greatest decline in the inflation

00:12rate at any time this century. And at the same time, we've kept unemployment at historically

00:18low levels. I want to thank you and the entire team for that effort. I want to compliment you

00:26for the direct file system that has allowed millions of taxpayers to be able to file their

00:30tax returns in an electronic form without paying 130 bucks to TurboTax. And quote your good words

00:39before the Senate, where you said one day, information that taxpayers receive on the W-2

00:45forms and the 1099s could be used to pre-populate the program. And I look forward to the day when

00:53the majority of Americans can file their tax return in less than two minutes simply by seeing

00:59the W-2 form and the 1099 information. They already achieved that in about a dozen countries

01:06in Europe. The gentleman from Arkansas mentioned the Repo Act. Those assets should be used to go

01:14to Ukraine. But there are Americans who have claims against those assets, judgments against

01:20those assets. And I hope that we wouldn't send all the money to Ukraine and then tell the

01:26Americans with claims that they're out of luck. The anti-money laundering laws are important.

01:37I want to bring to your attention that Florida and now Tennessee have laws designed to, and it's

01:44perhaps a good purpose of these laws, to say that you shouldn't be denied financial services because

01:49of your political opinions or religious beliefs. But I hope that you will work with those states

01:55and preempt those laws as necessary to protect the Bank Secrecy Act. We shouldn't be in a

02:01circumstance where you lose your account because you have all these suspicious activity reports

02:07and the bank can't tell you about the suspicious activity reports. And all of a sudden you think

02:13it's because of your political beliefs. In the past when you've come here, I've talked to you

02:21about how China has incentives for its domestic taxpayers to invest in Chinese companies, but

02:28denies those for investments in the United States. But we have incentives for Americans to invest.

02:33We call it capital gains allowance. And we provide those to those who invest in China. But I want to

02:39focus instead on India. India has cut its corporate tax rate from 40 percent to 22 percent,

02:46but they have excluded branches of foreign companies. So many U.S. companies can just form a

02:54subsidiary and take advantage of that 22 percent rate, but American financial institutions have

03:00branches. As a technical matter, they can't form a subsidiary. And I hope, can I count on you to

03:07bring this up with the Indian Ministry of Finance, that American companies should have the same tax

03:14rate as Indian companies in India. Well, I'd be glad to have my staff discuss this with you in

03:20greater detail and to understand the issue. I look forward to that. I want to commend you for

03:26sanctioning individuals who use sexual violence as a weapon of war in Sudan, the Democratic Republic

03:33of Congo in South Sudan. But the greatest use of sexual violence in war this century

03:42is the 100,000 Tigrayan women who have been subjected to sexual violence in northern Ethiopia.

03:51Can you commit to applying the same standards that you did for Sudan, the DRC, and South Sudan

03:59to individuals, particularly in the Ethiopian and Eritrean military, who have carried out this

04:07campaign of sexual violence against Tigrayan women? Can I count on you to use the same standards?

04:11So this is really a determination that has to be made by the State Department

04:17rather than Treasury, but certainly human rights violations have been a concern.

04:25And finally, the Russian Central Bank has urged the use of crypto to evade

04:34Western sanctions. A stable coin offers no particular advantage in that it's stable,

04:40you can't make money by holding it, and it usually doesn't pay interest, certainly not

04:45the interest you get on money market funds. Its sole advantage is evading our sanctions

04:50and other laws, including tax laws. And I hope that in enforcing our sanctions on Russia,

04:56you will not facilitate that by facilitating stable coin.

05:00We are very attentive to the use of cryptocurrencies and stable coins. We don't

05:08think it's a very substantial thing that Russia is doing, but as our sanctions bite more and more,

05:18it becomes a concern.

Brad Sherman Commends Treasury Sec. Janet Yellen On Electronic Tax Return Innovations

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